The students entered the classroom one at a time in silence. No noise was being made, no words were spoken. Everyone was merely prepared for the start of another plain uninteresting lesson and patiently waiting for their teacher to enter the classroom.

The scenery of that small class of second year students had changed incredibly. They were always known to be the noisiest class in the entire school, as it consisted of all sorts of crazy students: from the most naughty and silly idiots to the popular kingkas and queenkas who hardly cared about anything but their good looks. However, this was long before one of their fellow students apparently got sick of being there and ran away from them. Ever since that day, they were the first class in the school to immerse themselves in absolute silence and act as ordinary obedient students.

The students sat up straight on their chairs as soon as they saw an elegant, young and thin woman slowly enter. They immediately realized that it was a new teacher as they never remembered her teaching the class before. She sat on the teacher’s desk and placed her hands on the table while taking a quick look at all the students with a wide smile already drawn on her face.

“Hello students,” she began her self-introduction. “I’m teacher Han and I will temporarily replace your History teacher, as he will not be able to come to the school for a short period of time.”

Park Miyeon looked at the teacher, rather startled. The History lessons were the most awkward and unpleasant lessons of each school day, with the coldest atmosphere. If she replaces the teacher, does that mean she will replace the silence too?

The teacher took a second quick look at the students. This time, she did notice how there was an empty seat among the students sitting at the left edge of the classroom, and although she was surprised at the view, she still kept that friendly and bright smile on her face. “I can see that one of your classmates is absent,” she stated, looking at the area again carefully to ensure that that student was absent indeed.

Everyone was in anguish as they watched the teacher get up from her chair and walk towards the back of the classroom. With an expression on her face that looked creepy to the students sitting on that spot, she approached a dorky blonde guy with glasses sitting right behind Miyeon.

“What’s your missing classmate’s name?” the teacher asked the speechless guy while folding her arms across her chest.

Kim Namjoon, the kingka of the school, was unfortunately the unlucky one to be asked to mention Park Jimin’s name. No other teacher had questioned a student about him before, except for this new teacher who had evidently gone to that class to fix the whole situation. Namjoon kept staring at the teacher with his mouth half opened, not knowing how to mention a name that had not been called for such a long time.

“I just asked you something…!” the teacher insisted with a high-pitched voice, smiling even more widely.

The determination in his new teacher’s speech and creepy confident smile made Namjoon struggle even more to let those two words come out of his mouth. “P-Park Jimin,” he eventually stuttered with his deep voice, which he tried hard to let out.

“Park Jimin…” she repeated to herself gently while she was in her deep thoughts.

Straight after that, she made a slow and big step towards the desk next to Namjoon’s, where Choi Hyejin was sitting. She stood still beside Hyejin, who had bent her head down letting her stylish long blond curls come in touch with the wooden surface of her desk, and folded her arms again. “Do you have anything important to share with us about your classmate?” she questioned her with the same wide smile.

Placing her hands on her desk and lifting her head up to look at her teacher straight in the eyes, Hyejin immediately turned the melancholy expression on her face into a serious and respectful one. Noticing how much Hyejin seemed to have prepared herself for a straight reply, Miyeon gazed at Hyejin in suspense, fearing her alleged friend’s possible responses.

“Well…” Hyejin began her speech and cleared . “We are now used to being without him.”

Everyone, including the teacher, whose smile had just begun to fade rapidly, was taken aback by Hyejin’s startling and unexpected statement. As expected, all of the students’ eyes turned to Hyejin, with everyone glaring at her in displeasure to hear such harsh words from a classmate of theirs. Miyeon fiddled with her fingers being the most frustrated of all, let alone when she had to hear those tough words from a girl who was supposed to acknowledge her deep emotions.

“Why do you say so?” teacher Han asked Hyejin as soon as the classroom reverted to sufficient silence.

“The thing is,” Hyejin explained, “it’s been two weeks since he last turned up in this school. No one knows where he is; he has probably ended up somewhere outside of Seoul.”

This sarcastic announcement caused great surprise to teacher Han, who rolled her eyes and opened in shock. Hyejin simply shrugged and the teacher walked to the schoolboard, catching all the students’ attention straight away.

“It’s a shame that you have a classmate like Mr Park,” the teacher introduced her long speech. “What he is doing is very unethical. Not only is he abandoning his friends, family and school environment in such a mean way, he is also breaking our school rules! You guys all must know how immoral it is to skip school for no valid reason. I hope you all learn from this unforgivable mistake of your pitiful classmate’s and teach yourselves to be mature, honest and thoughtful people in the future. Please don’t ever consider following your fellow student’s terrible example.”

Hearing all these words, Miyeon felt the urge to stand up for the love of her life and explain to the teacher that it was not his fault for his wrongdoings and that it was the students that had caused him to feel such a strong need to run away. But she prevented herself from doing so – again – as she would only make more and more people detest her that way. After all, no one seemed to accept her feelings for Park Jimin.

☼

It was lunch time. The cafeteria was very noisy and crowded as opposed to the everyday loneliness of the classroom. Hyejin was the only one who was not being accompanied by a large group of friends; instead, she was happily sitting only a few inches away from her boyfriend, Kim Taehyung.

“How was your day?” Taehyung smiled and came even closer to her, pressing his nose delicately onto her cheek.

“Since you were sitting right behind me, it was perfectly fine, Tae,” Hyejin replied softly and smiled at him back.

The two were continuing their sweet chat, getting closer and closer to each other, when they suddenly noticed a smiling girl making her steps towards their table, causing them to pull away.

“Can I sit with you guys?” Miyeon asked them cheerfully while she was taking a seat with the company.

“I thought you needed some time alone?” Hyejin exclaimed, glaring at Miyeon in both surprise and disgust. How could a girl who had repetitively pushed her away with her misery have the audacity to sit with her and her boyfriend at lunch?

“Just let her sit,” Taehyung meddled in with his famous grin.

Hyejin disliked the idea of hanging out with Miyeon at that particular moment, but she eventually gave in as there was no point in causing unnecessary intensity. Miyeon completely ignored the dissatisfaction in Hyejin’s eyes and smiled at Taehyung, laying her food tray on the table and looking at both her friends shyly.

On the other hand, Taehyung noticed the disapproval in Hyejin’s look, and that left him puzzled. What happened to these girls? Did they just have a quarrel or something? However, he chose not to show any concern to the girls, as it might only ruin the warm and pleasant atmosphere of his two friends’ company.

Miyeon was totally not in a good mood at all, but she could not carry on showing it. She was actually an outgoing person and part of a large group of friends, and her friends meant much more to her than others thought. Her life had already become worthless, so she did not want to lose her friends too, hence her fake smile.

“What do you guys think of that new teacher?” Hyejin started a new conversation.

“I don’t like her…” Miyeon muttered while picking up her chopsticks.

Hearing this reply of hers, Hyejin felt her constant suspicions come back. Her eyes were now full of irritation and unjustifiable anger towards her so-called friend. Miyeon was the first one to notice Hyejin’s disapproving look, and although she felt extremely annoyed, she tried hard to keep cool and not to imitate her. Taehyung also looked at her and became even more puzzled, as he was now almost sure there was definitely something wrong with both girls.

“I need to talk to you privately,” Miyeon requested gently.

Hyejin simply looked at Miyeon in complete silence, yet still in her deep thoughts. What on Earth is she going to say again?

Taehyung was about to get up and leave the two girls alone as soon as he heard this, but Miyeon stopped him with a gesture. “No,” she called out. “After classes.”

☼

Hyejin soundlessly followed Miyeon to the quiet rooftop of the school building. It was difficult for her to hide her annoyance. She was sure that Miyeon would just shout the same words that she did each and every time they met, and was totally not in the mood to hear any more of her grumbles.

Miyeon was much more furious than she might seem, though. Deep inside, she strongly believed that Hyejin was somehow connected with the whole situation, as she was aware of her alleged friend’s unreasonable hatred towards Park Jimin. She knew that something had gone wrong and that nothing similar would ever happen for no significant reason.

Miyeon folded her arms and looked at Hyejin straight in the eyes as if she were going to threaten her. Hyejin tried to avoid eye contact with her and simply stared at the ground.

“Hey,” Miyeon called calmly, but the anger in her voice was still easily noticeable. “You claim that you have plenty of reasons to stay mad at me…” she continued.

Hyejin finally looked up and folded her arms in frustration, watching as Miyeon was slowly and suspensefully walking closer and closer towards her.

“…But that doesn’t give you the right to keep secrets from me,” Miyeon finished her sentence.

“I have nothing to hide from you. What are you implying?” Hyejin exclaimed angrily.

“Look…” Miyeon started, taking one more large step towards Hyejin. “You… You know where he is, don’t you?”

“I have no idea where that moron has gone, OK?” Hyejin yelled. She was about to quickly go away, but Miyeon grabbed her arm to stop her.

“Where are you off to?” she asked – this time, she was no longer keeping her anger from bursting out.

Hyejin turned back towards Miyeon. There was a short silence between the two girls for a second, but Miyeon was now barely standing an inch away from Hyejin.

“Tell me…” – Miyeon lowered her voice again. “The last time you got to see Jimin before he disappeared, what happened?”

Hyejin rolled her eyes and stared at her in shock and embarrassment. She was keeping a big secret indeed and she felt it was not the right moment to blurt out everything. She could not directly reveal that her hatred for Jimin had reached so far that she had ended up being his bully. She called him names every time she confronted him. Jimin hardly ever showed any offense by her words, but something shocking like this had clearly been expected by her as she considered him to be a guy who almost never expressed his feelings. This was the only fact Miyeon was surprisingly unaware of, and she only thought of Hyejin as a good friend of hers.

“Won’t you answer?” Miyeon insisted, raising her eyebrow at Hyejin sarcastically, noticing the latter’s speechless state.

Hyejin took a step back, ready to leave. “I called him a loser! Are you pleased now?” she blurted out without taking anything into account.

Hyejin quickly walked away, but this time, Miyeon only stared instead of stopping her. She was shocked and hurt by her alleged friend’s unacceptable behavior.

How could someone who knew she had such deep feelings for Jimin treat him like that?